Liés par le crime

This enjoyable film reminds me of a more pedestrian version of Last of the Dog Men, at least in feel. The landscape is compelling and the performances all around are quite good. The director has an easy hand which works well even with the mystery and pseudo-action sequences. Good job by the young girl that plays Hauer's daughter. Too often these child roles fall into the maudlin, but she comes across convincingly here.

The highlight isn't the none-too-convoluted plot, but rather the interaction between the two leads. You need to suspend disbelief for some of the story line elements, but the reward is a fun film that was made with obvious care. And it is quite refreshing to see Hauer with some decent material to work with. He may play a good villain, but is at his finest when exploring the layers of a troubled good guy.

"Partners in Crime" is a surprisingly good little movie. Okay, you know who the villain is in the first half hour, but the story still contains enough surprises to be interesting. Rutger Hauer (who's one of my favorite actors even in bad movies) is very good as a small town detective who's reunited with his ex-wife, a successful FBI agent. He has great scenes with the actress who plays the ex-wife and with the young girl who plays his daughter from a subsequent marriage. For a film that's marketed as a B-movie action flick, there is actually a great deal of character development and some very good performances. If you're bored with everything in the new releases section at the video store, try this one.

The film is worth watching primarily because of the beauty of the father (Rutger Hauer) - daughter (Sarah Ashley) relationship. Touching scenes take place between the two characters, showing the true love between a parent who raises his child alone, without a mother. This puts the film in the category of Melodrama. The Crime or Thriller category is a bit softer, well, that's how the script is written. In my humble opinion, an experienced police detective (Hauer) and an equally experienced FBI agent (ex-wife played by the charming Paulina Porizkova), seconded by two more FBI agents, would have realized from the very beginning who the perpetrator could be, more precisely, immediately after the moment when Gene Reardon (Hauer) and Lloyd Dyer (Andrew Dolan) searched, just the two of them, the lockers in the changing rooms. That's how it is in the movies! And, from my own experience, it's not easy to make a perfect film. The important thing is to make one worthy of being watched.

Basically this movie isn't anything new or refreshing, I mean movies like these are made dozens of times every year. This is one of those movies were not an awful lot is wrong with but its just to unoriginal or not refreshing enough to make this movie a must see. It's one of those typical 6 out of 10 movies.

The movie is a standard police/crime movie in which the main characters has to solve a case. No the movie most certainly isn't filled with any new or original moments and elements but it serves its purpose well and the movie is technically not badly made.

Finally a movie in which Rutger Hauer can show again how a great actor he is. Also Paulina Porizkova really isn't a bad actress despite the fact that she already had received a Razzie nomination for her role in "Her Alibi" from 1989. Hauer and Porizkova make a great screen duo and make the story believable and likable enough.

The story and the sidelines of it are interesting enough to fill 95 minutes. None of the dramatic and perhaps cliché sidelines of the story are ever getting distracting, which of course is a positive thing to say.

Yes of course you're ten times better of watching a good English detective series but this movie certainly is a watchable one, despite the fact that it isn't anything new or really special.

6/10

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Acting was impeccable. Hauer conveyed his emotions as ex husband and father in a very convincing way. His daughter was also great in the role. Paulina was lovely as always and the rest of the cast did the job more than fine.

Dialogues are sparky, fast, intelligent, brilliant. Landscapes also help.

To some extent, this film looks like a made-for-TV crime story produced by Hallmark, but it was so succesful that I wouldn't complain.

The bad guy came as a far fetched choice, but often they are in this type of whodonits. Seat back, relax and enjoy.